PARLIAMENT REJECTS SCRUTINY OF EXPENSES: MEPs on Monday rejected proposals to tighten the rules around how elected representatives use the so-called General Expenditure Allowance (GEA) — a payment of €4,416 per month given to MEPs as a lump sum in addition to their regular pre-tax monthly salary of €8,611. They are not required to provide any proof of how the money is spent — usually in their home constituency for office expenses. The proposals blocked by Parliament’s 15-member executive committee would have required MEPs to keep their GEA receipts, have them checked by an external auditor and even publish this information.

It’s time to treat parliamentary expenses as what they are, a second salary, and tax them accordingly, according to Anuška Delić, an investigative journalist based in Slovenia.

BACKING FOR (MODEST) ELECTION CHANGES: After a vote in Parliament, you can now expect to see internet voting options, polling stations in non-EU countries, tougher penalties for those who vote in more than one country, and European party logos next to national party logos on ballot papers. EU countries may now also introduce an election threshold requiring that parties achieve 2 percent of the vote before qualifying for a seat (in countries such as Germany where MEPs are elected from party lists in a single national constituency). Until now you could be elected with barely 1 percent of the vote.

**A message from the Florence School of Regulation, EUI: Are you a professional in the electricity sector? Join us in Florence for the workshop series organized by the Horizon2020 project SmartNet on the topic of TSO-DSO coordination. Three workshops will take place on October 24-26, 2018 at the European University Institute. Learn more and register free of charge here.**

LOBBYING TRANSPARENCY UPDATE: Our own Florian Eder reports that 20 EU governments support ambassadors and their deputies only being able to meet with registered lobbyists — but that this should only apply during their turn at the helm of the rotating Council presidency and in the six months leading up to it. That would mean governments would be obliged to be transparent about their meetings roughly once every 13 years! Group leaders in Parliament, meanwhile, agreed that MEPs can now sign a voluntary declaration saying they follow the “systematic practice” of only meeting registered lobbyists, and may publish this on their Parliament web pages.

VICTORIA MAIN IS NEW CEO AT CAMBRE — “I’VE NEVER DONE ANYTHING IN A TRADITIONAL WAY”:Tom Parker has left his post as CEO of the consultancy Cambre Associates, promoted up to the role of chief sales officer at the SEC Group to which Cambre belongs. Parker is replaced by former journalist Victoria Main, who most recently headed Cambre’s technology and media practice and is the brainchild behind the firm’s Brussels Calling event series. Main’s appointment is a sign of the increasing importance of policy communications in the Brussels lobbying landscape. She told Influence: “I’ve never done anything in a traditional way at any stage of my life. You can’t do PR and comms in a vacuum. It (her appointment) does show that Brussels is moving on and that Cambre is recognising the reality.”

Parker said consultancies in Brussels “are now much closer to marketing communications” in ways “that five years ago you wouldn’t have believed.” Parker’s new role has been created just for him, with a view to him acting as the glue in the SEC network, which has been a loose network of consultancies thus far. Parker said he has a “broad mandate to make that work,” and will develop a plan of action over the summer.

Disclosure: Ryan Heath’s partner works at Cambre Associates

HEALTH CORNER

RED ALERT — CANADIAN BIOFUEL LOBBYING INTENSIFIES: Canadian company Agrisoma Biosiences Inc. is pushing to get “Carinata,” its second generation biofuel, subsidized by the EU and placed on the EU’s Renewable Energy Directive (RED) list. The proposal passed the first hearing in the Parliament and is making its rounds in the Commission and the Council, according to Brussels Influence sources. Agrisoma has at least two influential MEPs from Hungary and the Czech Republic pushing for this outcome, and says that if approved for the RED list it will set up a line of Carinata production on the Continent. According to the EU transparency register, German law/lobbying firm Alber and Geiger represents Agrisoma.

WHEN ERIN BROCKOVICH MEETS CAPE FEAR? The U.S state of North Carolina was reminded of Julia Roberts’ Oscar-winning performance fighting for victims of toxic chemical misuse when the chemical GenX (a necessary ingredient for making Teflon) was found in the lake Cape Fear. The company Chemours, formerly known as DuPont, allegedly disposed of it into the water.

The same happened in South Holland province last year, where Chemours’ European production facility is located. A similar product to GenX is already banned in Europe and the U.S., but the more advanced GenX is not yet forbidden since it is a relatively new chemical and still being tested. Dutch politicians are now pushing to ban the chemical completely.

PUBLIC HEALTH — ‘MARCH OF THE GUINEA PIGS’ IN STRASBOURG: French Green MEP Michèle Rivasi’s multi-month protest arrived in Strasbourg Tuesday. The targets: pesticides, junk food, nuclear waste, pollution and genetically modified organisms. The protest, according to its Facebook page, aimed to “denounce the EU’s openness to industrial lobbies that poison us and call for better protections of our health by taking better account of environmental factors.”

**Join us at the Global Public Affairs Forum, (GPAC Forum) an international event dedicated to C-level public affairs professionals on September 28, in Paris. Come to benchmark new approaches to lobbying, review the latest advocacy methodologies in the digital era and share best practices on how to measure your department’s contribution to business. We have designed an international forum that will feature inspirational keynote speeches, thought-provoking debates, and unique networking opportunities. For additional information on GPAC Forum, email Chloé Mimault-Talagrand at cmimault@dii.eu. **

TOBACCO — MEP GOES ALL OUT: French leftist MEP Younous Omarjee, who unsuccessfully tried to stop a new EU track and trace scheme for tobacco earlier this year (here’s a refresher), has now published a report called “The Black Book of the Tobacco Lobby in Europe,” French media reported. In it, Omarjee claims tobacco companies fuel almost all of the illegal tobacco trade in Europe, according to France TV Info. This leads to EU losses of some €20 billion in tax revenues and some 79,000 premature deaths because of tobacco in France alone, he said.

YET MORE ACRONYM DOUBLE-UPS: In addition to the six previously-listed ESAs operating in Brussels, there is also the European Sunlight Association, the voice of Europe’s indoor tanning sector (h/t Michael Tscherny) and the European Seed Association (h/t Rita Giannini). You can catch up on the other ESAs in last week’s Influence.

MORE TIPS ON WHERE TO LOBBY DANES: There are so many Danish gathering places it’s a wonder they have time to do anything other than meet up. The Black Sheep (cocktails and live music) and La Diligence (small-scale karaoke) at Flagey are popular with young Danes (h/t Alexander von Wildenrath Løvgreen).

POLITICO BUYS LEGISLATIVE INTELLIGENCE APP STATEHILL: POLITICO Europe is launching a news and data service called Pro Intelligence, which will distill and visualize data collected by Stockholm-based legislative tracking company Statehill, which now joins the POLITICO family.

THEY SAID WHAT?

US FART ACT: That’s the Fair and Reciprocal Tariffs Act, proposed by the United States.

RIDICULOUS HEADLINE OF THE WEEK:“Untidy desks may be a GDPR risk,” according to the Financial Times. Memo to all GDPR conspiracy theorists: data protection authorities barely have the resources to monitor Facebook. They do not have time to look at your desk.

ECR shifts to the right: The far-right Sweden Democrats, who have often topped Swedish opinion polls in the last year — with support from around a quarter of the population — have joined the European Conservatives and Reformists group in the European Parliament, leaving the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy group. That matters because the Sweden Democrats will likely pick up seats in the 2019 election, and the ECR is losing its biggest party, the U.K. Conservatives, thanks to Brexit.

Socialist Spitzenkandidat timeline: Nominations close on October 19. An EU-wide primary vote will take place on December 1 if there is more than one candidate. A Socialist congress will ratify the result on December 7 -8.

En Marche’s Castaner could be a candidate: The chief executive of République en Marche, Christophe Castaner, told France Info “I could possibly be a candidate” and he is currently on a “European tour to build his progressive platform.” Next stops on the tour include Poland and Ireland.

Nomination for best campaign ad of the year: Once again it’s from the United States rather than Europe, this time from 28-year-old Alexandria Ocasio-Ortega, who defied the Democratic establishment — and won — her primary race. Watch it all the way through (h/t Kees Frijters).

ITALY: Tech Italy Advocates launched Wednesday as part of the Global Tech Advocates network. Enrico Noseda leads the group (he is also head of the Open Innovation program at Cariplo Factory, and was formerly the global head of product business development at Skype). Italy’s venture capital funding market is worth just 2 percent of the U.K. market.

GLOBAL GLANCE

FAKE INFLUENCE: President Donald Trump has been rebuked by fact-checkers (hardly a first) after claiming on Twitter that the Obama administration granted citizenship to 2,500 Iranians during the Iran deal negotiations. Citizenship was granted to Iranian state officials too, Trump tweeted. Obama’s former Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes replied directly on Twitter, saying that Trump’s claim is “just a big lie.”

INFLUENCERS

YOU’RE INVITED: The International Association of Young Lawyers invites you to their conference: “Is the dream of globalization over? Are we heading towards or away from international integration?” It runs from August 28 to September 1. Herman Van Rompuy will open the Congress.

Antonio Vitorino has broken the U.S. grip on the U.N.’s International Organization on Migration. Its new chief is the original implementer of the EU’s Dublin regulation.

António Campinos of Portugal has started as president of the European Patent Office.

Edwin van Os is now a legal adviser at Council of the European Union.

Claudia Cajvan has been promoted to political adviser at the European People’s Party.

Stan Veuger is now visiting lecturer of economics at Harvard University.

Alex Wickham is joining BuzzFeed News as senior political correspondent. He moves from Guido Fawkes.

Anna Maria Kaczmarek started as chemicals, water and sustainability manager at EUROFER.

Pierantonio Rizzo has been promoted to public policy manager at GSMA, the mobile network operators’ trade body.

Giulia Barenghi is now an EU project assistant at PNO Consultants — Europe

Thanks to Florian Eder, Cat Contiguglia, Sarah Wheaton and Anca Gurzu

**A message from the Florence School of Regulation, EUI: Is your work or research dealing with EU electricity networks? Are you interested in distributed energy resources, TSO-DSO coordination schemes, real-time markets, and the regulatory implications? We invite you in Florence to learn and discuss the results achieved by the Horizon2020 project SmartNet. Three workshops will take place on October 24-26, 2018 at the Florence School of Regulation, European University institute. Each day, different perspectives and interests of the stakeholders will be presented by the SmartNet project team. Day 1: TSOs/DSOs; Day 2: Energy Regulators; Day 3: Utilities and Traders. Registration is free of charge (deadline: September 24). For more information on the program and to register, please visit the webpage of the Florence School of Regulation. Press and Media contact: chiara.canestrini@eui.eu **